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Sep. 2nd, 2003 12:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beetigerI’m not really the rugged wilderness type, overall. I can’t carry very much, and my fingers are clumsy, and my sense of direction leaves something to be desired. But I am notably heliotropic, and sleeping outside with trees and rocks and birds and natural light waking me up in the morning are some of the things that keep my soul going, now and again. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lediva is definitely an indoor cat, but is also notably flexible and brave, so she accompanied me to the wilds of an open field near a riverystream outside Northhampton for a few days of sleeping in a tent and hanging out with bisexual people. I’m not quite sure what bisexuality has to do with camping, but hey, it’s a theme.
Despite my arrangements to make things as cushy and cozy as possible, and despite the fact that this was the style of camping where you drive to a convenient place and then set up your tent next to it, fate was not kind to us. We somehow managed to snap one of the three elastic-loaded poles for the tent, and had to arrange the assistance of an EMT with duct tape and splints to salvage it for the weekend. The airbed, which I’d specifically tested earlier in the week to make sure it was functioning okay, had both some trouble with the initial inflate and some sort of looseness about the air valve that meant we needed to reinflate it every few hours. Our next-site-over neighbors somehow lost their cat on Friday night, and so my quiet evenings were somewhat spoiled by the sound of hours and hours of "here kitty kitty" alternating with sobbing. We set one of my campchairs on fire with the citronella candle, and I still have uncountably many bites.
The highlight of the weekend, for me, was getting to go nude swimming/sunbathing in a calm section of riverlet, across a stream and a short hike through woods and field. My Tevas served me pretty well in the water, and although I did flop on my butt once on the stream fording, right after claiming I was "just fine", the skills I learned in the Grand Canyon a few years ago seemed to do fairly well for me, despite the new center of balance. Poorlediva also managed to fall, and in her only pair of jeans, too. I think maybe I didn’t convince her how great this whole outdoor thing was. At the swimming hole, soaking my ankles in cold cold water while sitting on a rock, mermaid-like, was a good thing. Hanging out with the sun on my skin with a few dozen other very average looking naked people felt great, and managed to kick the body image issue I was having right out on its ass, even if I was the only one with my abdomen looking like a small continent. A small Martian continent, now, as I got a bit too much sun and it’s very, very red.
We ate guacamole and poptarts and parmalat milk and hard-boiled eggs and hotdogs roasted on someone else’s fire. I got to hang out a bit with two old friends from college whom I haven’t seen in years, and they still seemed more or less like the people I remembered, which pleased me. I was somewhat disappointed by the lack of scheduled stuff to do; it made the whole scene feel a little more cliquish than it really had to be.
By Sunday morning, I’d decided thatlediva deserved a break, and I took her home to her warm bed in Arlington, the one you don’t need to blow up every three hours, with the bathroom which isn’t a wet cold walk across a field away. If I can’t have a lover who will take me out dancing waltzes and sleeping under the stars as if it were a natural thing to do, at least I’ve got one or two who are willing to indulge me now and again.
lediva is definitely an indoor cat, but is also notably flexible and brave, so she accompanied me to the wilds of an open field near a riverystream outside Northhampton for a few days of sleeping in a tent and hanging out with bisexual people. I’m not quite sure what bisexuality has to do with camping, but hey, it’s a theme.Despite my arrangements to make things as cushy and cozy as possible, and despite the fact that this was the style of camping where you drive to a convenient place and then set up your tent next to it, fate was not kind to us. We somehow managed to snap one of the three elastic-loaded poles for the tent, and had to arrange the assistance of an EMT with duct tape and splints to salvage it for the weekend. The airbed, which I’d specifically tested earlier in the week to make sure it was functioning okay, had both some trouble with the initial inflate and some sort of looseness about the air valve that meant we needed to reinflate it every few hours. Our next-site-over neighbors somehow lost their cat on Friday night, and so my quiet evenings were somewhat spoiled by the sound of hours and hours of "here kitty kitty" alternating with sobbing. We set one of my campchairs on fire with the citronella candle, and I still have uncountably many bites.
The highlight of the weekend, for me, was getting to go nude swimming/sunbathing in a calm section of riverlet, across a stream and a short hike through woods and field. My Tevas served me pretty well in the water, and although I did flop on my butt once on the stream fording, right after claiming I was "just fine", the skills I learned in the Grand Canyon a few years ago seemed to do fairly well for me, despite the new center of balance. Poor
lediva also managed to fall, and in her only pair of jeans, too. I think maybe I didn’t convince her how great this whole outdoor thing was. At the swimming hole, soaking my ankles in cold cold water while sitting on a rock, mermaid-like, was a good thing. Hanging out with the sun on my skin with a few dozen other very average looking naked people felt great, and managed to kick the body image issue I was having right out on its ass, even if I was the only one with my abdomen looking like a small continent. A small Martian continent, now, as I got a bit too much sun and it’s very, very red.We ate guacamole and poptarts and parmalat milk and hard-boiled eggs and hotdogs roasted on someone else’s fire. I got to hang out a bit with two old friends from college whom I haven’t seen in years, and they still seemed more or less like the people I remembered, which pleased me. I was somewhat disappointed by the lack of scheduled stuff to do; it made the whole scene feel a little more cliquish than it really had to be.
By Sunday morning, I’d decided that
lediva deserved a break, and I took her home to her warm bed in Arlington, the one you don’t need to blow up every three hours, with the bathroom which isn’t a wet cold walk across a field away. If I can’t have a lover who will take me out dancing waltzes and sleeping under the stars as if it were a natural thing to do, at least I’ve got one or two who are willing to indulge me now and again.
